


Was this your boyhood vision (to endure the world's derision)

by AnbarElectrum



Series: Crashing Down [3]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Emotionally Broken Immortals, Episode: v06e05 The Coming Storm, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Issues, Sort of? - Freeform, WTB new edition of the DSM incl. disorders endemic to budding gestalt entities, emotional breakdown, survivor's guilt, technically Ozpin isn't present because canon compliance but the fic still kinda hinges on him?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:47:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22108825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnbarElectrum/pseuds/AnbarElectrum
Summary: It's silent.  To Oscar's surprise, it's not a welcome change.For the first time in nearly a year, Oscar only has one voice in his head: his own.  Unfortunately, his current headspace is one he doesn't want to be alone in.  He doesn't know if he wants to talk.  He doesn't know if anyone would want to listen.  He doesn't know what he's feeling, what he's thinking, or if he'll find sympathy for any of it among the group of shocked and angered near-strangers that are somehow still his closest friends.  Enter Maria Calavera, the least familiar of them all—but also the least shocked, the least angry, and for now, the most stable.Oscar may not know if he wants to talk, but Maria is willing to listen.Cross-posted from my ff.net account.
Relationships: Maria Calavera & Oscar Pine
Series: Crashing Down [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1574203
Comments: 5
Kudos: 85





	Was this your boyhood vision (to endure the world's derision)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted 1/??/19
> 
> Ah, Maria Calavera. AKA the best part of Volume 6. Prove me wrong.  
> It's been awhile, but I seem to recall my reasons for writing this were something along the lines of: "No, come on, NO ONE is as chill about major life reveals as Oscar is being right now. He's—he's not acting like he's bottling anything up, though. He's just...zen. Did he already break down off-screen sometime? Why do they keep developing Oscar's character off-screen??? And when would he even have...  
> ...  
> *pulls out laptop* Well, I'm not sleeping tonight."  
> What I really wanted to do was to explore how Oscar would have been affected by Jinn's revelations in a different way from the rest of the group: learning this information for the first time, but feeling it on as personal and visceral a level as Ozpin. This objective dovetailed neatly with Operation: Just Let Oscar Cry, Dammit, and thus this fic was born.

It’s silent. To Oscar’s surprise, it’s not a welcome change.

Sitting on the floor in front of the fireplace in the old Brunswick ranch house with a loud clamour of echoing nothing inside his skull, he feels as if he is going mad, his thoughts and emotions bouncing around aimlessly inside a mind that feels too big for one. He wonders if that’s just because he’d started acclimating to Ozpin’s presence, or if having the old wizard sharing space with him has actually changed him somehow, inside. Is he now just…wired differently? Altered at some basic level to support two minds, two souls, even if only for a little while before…

He sighs heavily, and out of the corner of his eye he sees Maria glance at him over top of the volume in her hands. He doesn’t look up at her, but his own hands tighten defensively around the cane laid across his lap, just waiting for her to say something.

Instead, the curious old woman hums in a timbre Oscar can’t decipher and bows her head over the pages again, her mechanical eyes seeming to stare blankly down.

He forces himself to relax, deliberately loosening his grip. He needs to stop assuming everyone who so much as looks at him is judging him and poised to say as much. The trouble is, he knows that for once, he’s not just being anxious and overreacting. He has every reason to believe his newfound allies could just as swiftly turn to foes, or more likely just straight-up _leave_ once they get back to civilisation _,_ and the worst part is, he’s not sure he’d blame them for either move.

_(“Do you really think Leo was the first!?”)_

…He’s thinking like Ozpin, and he hates it, for so many reasons. Maybe it was a side effect of being, what had Ozpin called him—a like-minded soul? Or maybe the merge (or takeover) had already begun in earnest. Or maybe he was just turning into a cynical paranoiac on his own merits. Or maybe—

“You’re breathing like a bellows, son. Little young for heart trouble, aren’t you?”

His head whips around, and he stares at Maria with wide eyes.

(His right hand has already flown to the cane’s hilt in a seamless, darting motion, fingers slipping neatly under the knuckle-guard. It’s unclear which set of instincts sent it there.)

The old woman closes the book and sets it in her lap, resting a hand atop its cover. “Of course, there’s more than one kind of heart trouble, now isn’t there?”

Oscar doesn’t know what to say. Fortunately, Maria does.

“For example, there’s the kind young Ruby’s having, watching everyone around her break down or tune out while she tries to hold it all together. Then there’s whatever’s eating ol’ Branwen out there bad enough to make him kick a man while he’s down and never mind the boy who takes the bruise. And here we have you, young man. It’s Oscar, right? ’Fraid I missed that part of the introductions; everyone was too preoccupied with the other fella walking around in your skin.”

“Y-yeah. Oscar Pine,” he replies, trying not to dwell overlong on the mental image her last words have conjured. “I-it’s nice to meet you, Ms. Calavera,” he adds hastily, because she’s right; they really haven’t been introduced, and Auntie would be appalled at his lack of manners.

(She wouldn’t, really, not with so much _else_ to be appalled at, but it’s a comforting thought to hold onto.)

Maria snorts, laughs, hand slapping down on the hardbound book with a sharp _thwap_. “Ha! ‘Ms. Calavera’. My name’s Maria, lad, always has been. Getting old didn’t change that!”

“Right,” Oscar replies lamely, once again having to stamp down his own thoughts: getting old would change _his_ name, even if Ozpin kept his legal moniker.

Assuming, of course, that Ozpin ever came back from where he’s locked himself away, which seems less and less likely as time goes on without the faintest flicker of his presence. Honestly, the sense of Ozpin had been stronger during the months before he’d introduced himself than it was right now. Still, there’s no way an enchantment crafted by the God of Light Himself will give up so easily. Maybe now Oscar will wake up one day and just _be Ozpin,_ completely out of the blue, and neither of them will be happy about it. If that’s his only alternative, he reflects mournfully, he’d frankly preferred the original version of this whole reincarnation thing, where he could keep tabs on his once-and-future-self and track the progress of their integration. At least when he had Ozpin to talk everything out with, he had some chance of making peace with his fate as his predecessors presumably had.

“That said,” Maria says loudly, “while I’m no stickler for formalities, I do like it when people pay attention to me when I’m speaking to them.”

Oscar startles—and, _oh,_ he realises belatedly, he _had_ heard Maria’s voice dimly in the background for a bit there. “I’m sorry, I was just thinking. I shouldn’t have let myself get so distracted.”

“Hm.” The shutters on Maria’s goggles—eyes, she had been very insistent on calling them that—have closed so that only a tiny slit of blue light shows on either side.

…Oh gods, she’s _squinting_ at him, just like Auntie does.

“Y’know, I think that’s your problem,” she says. “Now, I’ve only known you for what, a day? And it’s fair to say that none of us are in any position to put our best foot forward here. But if I had to take what I know about you and guess, I’d say you think too much.”

“Think…too much?” Ozpin had always encouraged him to think _more,_ to examine every situation from every possible angle. They’d spent a decent chunk of their bedridden days after Haven running thought exercises, Ozpin tossing him hypotheticals and Oscar breaking them down as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Oscar hadn’t even needed much convincing; they’d both been bored out of their minds, and he’d always enjoyed puzzles. For her part, his aunt had been supportive of his bookworm tendencies even though she’d relied on his help around the farm. Said she was pleased he was taking an interest in his own education. To be told that he thought too much was literally unprecedented.

“Oh, yes. See, the trouble with thinking is that it’s just like everything else you do: eventually you do so much of it for so long that you just burn out. You’re turning circles in your head right now, and for what? Is thinking going to get you out of this situation—this _specific_ situation that’s weighing on you right this moment, worrying about how long you’ll be, well, you?”

“I…” Oscar turns his gaze to the floor. “I don’t know. Maybe? It can’t hurt to try.”

“Sure it can,” Maria says flatly. “You’ve been trying for hours and you look plenty hurt to me. Take it from someone who knows from experience, Oscar.” She taps the outer frame of her mechanical eyes. “Don’t break yourself fretting over what you can’t change. Adapt and push on.”

“Having an extra soul isn’t the same as lacking a pair of eyes,” Oscar replies. The words could have easily been biting, but instead they just sound tired. “There’s no such thing as a prosthetic personality, either.”

“Give those mad scientists up in Atlas time,” Maria says in a wry tone that leaves Oscar unsure of how much she’s joking. “Gods know there’s more than a few Atlesians who could do with a personality transplant; one in particular comes to mind…” Her eyes have dimmed into slits again, and she’s almost growling her last words. Then she shakes herself, her tone lightening as she goes on.

“But seriously now, time is exactly what it takes. These old things didn’t exist when I lost my original eyes, y’know. I made do with sunglasses and a white-tipped cane, same as any civilian on a budget. I had to wait for a better solution to come along, and it did. It’s not what I really wanted—my old eyes back—but I had to accept that was never going to happen. Accepting your new normal isn’t giving up, Oscar, even if it feels that way to you now. It’s the strongest thing you can possibly do.”

Her blank stare turns slightly towards the door. “Hmph. If only that girl with the fisticuffs would tamp down her temper, I think she’d be able to give you this talk just the same.”

“That’s my fault, though,” Oscar says quietly, tucking his chin against his chest. “It’s me she’s angry with.”

“No, it’s the old man inside your head she’s angry with, and if she’s any true friend of yours she’ll remember that once she cools off.” Maria pauses. “I can’t believe I’m actually having this conversation. There’s an ancient wizard-king living inside your head! And I thought I’d seen everything. So to speak.”

Except Ozpin is so much more than out-of-place thoughts in his head and phantom muscle memory in his limbs. Oscar wants to object because Maria doesn’t quite get it, but he doesn’t know how to explain. To say that yes, he’s worried about himself, about what’s going to happen to him and what’s happened to him already, but also that—that—

“I just watched my children die,” he blurts out, so abruptly that the horrifying words sound eerily casual. Conversational. “Up to then, I was watching Ozma’s life. Salem’s life, after he was gone. I felt—I saw Ozma’s second life and it just hit me like a like a ton of bricks, how confused he looked, how scared. Neither of them knew it was coming. It was still a—a _them_ problem, even though it felt like seeing the first time I heard Ozpin from the outside. But the children—their children— _my children,_ Maria, _we killed our little girls—!”_

Maria moves faster than a woman her age should be able to, kneeling down next to him and resting a wrinkled hand on his back as he sobs.

“More than one kind of heart trouble,” she repeats softly, “and here’s you with more than one heart to be getting on with. Just you cry now, son. It’s your right.”

Oscar isn’t sure how long he spends weeping another man’s tears while a stranger’s touch anchors him, but there’s still light outside when he finally takes a series of deep, shuddering breaths and manages not to fall right back into the cycle. He feels like he’s been hollowed out, exhausted and numb, unable to really appreciate how the knot in his chest has loosened some from the release.

“I never wanted this,” he says hoarsely.

“Tough,” Maria replies, matter-of-fact.

Strangely, that makes Oscar laugh—a little hysterically, and without much mirth, but it beats the tears. “It really is, isn’t it?”

Maria’s hand works its way around to his far shoulder, and she squeezes him gently. “Now you’re getting it.”

She lets him go and eases herself backwards with a groan, so that she’s sitting rather than kneeling, both feet planted firmly against the floor.

“Here,” Oscar says, scrambling to his feet once he realises what she’s trying to do. He hands her his cane, then holds out his hand. Maria takes it in one of her own, using the cane to brace her weight against as Oscar helps pull her upright.

“Thank you kindly,” she says once she’s gotten her feet back under her. She raises his cane a little and inspects it closely. “This is good craftsmanship. Looks solid. It doesn’t transform?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Huh. Well, guess it does predate the modern Huntsman. Stands to reason, even if it is a bit of a shame.” She hands it back to him, nodding. “Something to be said for a good, stout stick though. Especially when you can use magic, I suppose!”

“Well, _I_ can’t—” Oscar cuts himself off, eyes wide.

Maria scoffs, throwing up her hands in disgust as she stumps back to the couch, her gait hitching a little without her own cane to support her. “You dwell on the existential crisis and the inherited nightmare material but completely forget you’re a wizard now! See what I mean about thinking too much?”

Oscar stares down at his open palm, his other hand wrapped loosely around his cane. Of course. He knows, somehow, that Ozma’s magic was bound to his Aura—which is one with Oscar’s Aura, now. Ozpin has all the expertise, but that power is part of _him._

“I feel like this could be really dangerous to mess with,” he says cautiously, as much to himself as to Maria. “And…Ozpin said something about his magic being finite. ‘Dwindling’, actually.”

“Well, something to save for a rainy day, then.”

He nods slowly.

After a moment, Maria speaks again. She sounds quite serious now. “You know, I’d mention it to the others, but they’re still pretty raw, so I guess you’ll have to be the first one to hear this.”

He looks up to see her seated on the couch again, patting the ornate skull figurine atop her cane. “Every Huntsman and Huntress signs up to fight a losing battle, to be foot soldiers in a war that can’t ever be won, and every last one knows it from the start, or else they’re delusional. That’s just how it is, and it’s how it’s always been. So this Salem woman can’t be killed? There’s no neat and tidy bow to tie on the whole Grimm problem? Ha! Why’re we all acting like this is news? Honestly.”

She shakes her head and picks up the journal again, cracking it open and flipping swiftly through the pages, looking for her place. “But people need time to grieve for their hopes same as for their loved ones. They’ll come around in time. Meanwhile, we’ll all just have to muddle through trying our best. That’s all anyone has any right to ask.”

Oscar’s brow furrows as he processes that, letting Maria’s words click into place. “Thanks,” he says at last.

Maria gives him a _look._ “For what, dear?”

“Being the voice of common sense,” Oscar replies, smiling rather sheepishly and rubbing at the back of his neck. “And, y’know. Talking to me. At all.”

“Well, from what I hear, you and I both got dropped into the deep end with this whole ancient conspiracy nonsense, so I’ll tell you what. You fill me in on some of the details I missed out on, and we’ll call it even.”

“Deal,” Oscar says, feeling calmer than he has in…hours.

Gods, it really _has_ been less than a day since Jinn knocked their world off its axis. It feels like an eternity. …No, that’s not true. He’d felt an echo of the span of Ozpin’s unnatural life earlier, the haunting loneliness of it. _That_ is what eternity feels like.

Even now, he expects Ozpin’s mind to brush against his, acting like a buffer against the overwhelming dread that rises every time he lets himself contemplate just how long the rest of his life threatens to be. When had he become used to things like that? When had he come to depend on them?

Oscar settles himself back down in front of the fire, idly calling forth just a little of his bottle-green Aura. It spiderwebs over his skin like static electricity, and when he lifts a hand, he sees a fine tracery of golden magic caught in the field of energy, shimmering like filigree against the fabric of his glove.

Everyone else is just so _angry_ at Ozpin, and Oscar gets it; hell, he’s got as much right to be furious as any of them and he _wants_ to be. It would be so much easier than walking this jagged line of liar and lied-to, of understanding and frustration. Anger would help blot out the constant low hum of fear, loosen the strangling pressure of the knotted cord that Ozpin’s old wounds and his own fresh ones have twined around each other to create. But even without taking into account the creeping numbness of sheer emotional exhaustion, he can’t be angry. He can’t be, because even though Ozpin is gone for now his guilt and shame and fathomless _loss_ are a weight in Oscar’s chest, threatening to blot out the lightness of Maria’s brusque kindness. He can’t be, because even as much as Oscar’s been through and as much as he hates the situation, he’s not far gone enough to hate himself.

Easier by far, Oscar thinks bitterly, if he could just stop _caring._ It seems a mercy that his earlier turmoil has left him oddly numb inside. He isn’t calm, he knows that, but he suspects this is as close as he’ll come for a long while.

He sits there in silence and lets the apathy roll over him like the snowy fog outside.


End file.
